Planned Parenthood

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“The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit
that we are children of God.”
Romans 8:16

The conversation was what I would call semi-planned. I knew it needed to happen soon, I just wasn’t sure when I was going to take the plunge.

It was apparent that our son Jacob (age 9) was getting some sex education from his schoolmates. Schoolmates who apparently weren’t very well-educated themselves. Someone needed to set the record straight.

So, one Fall Saturday morning, Jacob and I had the proverbial “birds and the bees” discussion. Only there weren’t any birds or bees in this discussion. Just moms and dads and marriage and commitments and Scripture and God – along with the proper anatomical equipment.

The discussion was good. I think it was helpful.

But the responses belonged on a Mastercard commercial. They were priceless!

“So you and mom did that?” he asked with a combination of shock and disgust.

A few moments later he added, “And you did that four times?” (Apparently a common question since Elizabeth asked Heather the same thing a few months earlier.)

“Yes, Jacob,” I responded glibly, “we had to do it four times.”

I explained to Jacob that, believe it or not, there would come a day when he actually wanted to do that.

But there would be plenty of time for that.

It’s interesting now that I consider it. It seems that Jacob assumed he was wanted. The fact that his mom and dad had done what “makes babies” told him that his mom and dad must have wanted a baby. His parents wanted a child and a child is what they got.

That’s not the case with all of us though, is it? Some of us go our entire lives wondering if we were ever really wanted. By anyone.

Somewhere inside every heart, inside every soul, is a desire to be wanted. By someone. By anyone. But especially by our parents.

As a teenager I owned several editions of a book called Truly Tasteless Jokes. I remember one joke quite clearly.

Question: What do you call a couple who uses the rhythm method of birth control?
Answer: Parents.

So, it seemed quite appropriate that some twenty years later my wife and I would become parents for the fourth time while “practicing” the rhythm method.

We had been thinking and praying for some time about whether or not to have a fourth child. We wondered if we could handle another set of shoes to pick up. Whether we could manage to find one more jacket while herding kids to the car.

I jokingly blame my wife for praying that God would “make the answer clear” without specifying that she still wanted a choice after that. I asked if the “+” sign on the pregnancy test was clear enough for her. : )

The blessing is that we both wanted that child. We wondered, and still wonder occasionally, what special thing God may want to do in his life since his conception was not so much by our choice as it was by God’s.

You want to know something beautiful? Something heartwarming and reassuring? God doesn’t have any children that should have been named “Oops.” Or “Afterthought.” Or “The one that snuck through.”

As a matter of fact, there is no Hebrew word that even resembles “oops.”

Because God doesn’t make mistakes. And he doesn’t acquire children by mistake either.

In the first chapter of the Gospel of John we find these words:
“But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.” (John 1:12-13)

Can I elaborate a bit? John is saying that you and I didn’t become children of God by some simple exchange of body fluids, or because a man was filled with sexual desire, or because a woman decided she wanted a baby. Neither chemistry, nor lust, nor human will had anything to do with our becoming a child of God.

Rather, we were offered the family name because the creator of the universe wanted us!

God wanted you. Before you were born. After you learned to walk. Even when you sinned. He wanted you. And he still does.

God looked around the world and decided that the world wouldn’t be quite right without you. And he also decided that you wouldn’t be quite right without him. So he sent his son to bridge the gap between us and him.

You are wanted. In Christ, God gave you the right to become one of his children. And God’s children are always wanted.

“In love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ,
according to the purpose of his will,
to the praise of his glorious grace,
with which he has blessed us in the Beloved.”

Eph 1:5-6

This Day

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“This is the day that the Lord has made.
Rejoice and be glad in it.”
Psalm 118:24

The year was 1996. I can’t remember the month or the week; only that it was a Monday. One day in 1996.

This day, this Monday, was near the birth of my life of faith. A few weeks earlier, God had breathed new life into my spiritually dead body. I found myself a new believer, an infant in Christ at the age of 25, charting a course for the future.

This day, this Monday, I was reading one of several chapters in the book, Seven Promises of a Promise Keeper, and was working on a special assignment: a personal prayer.

I sat thinking, pondering, then writing. Simple words formed a clear prayer for my future family. It would be a gift to my family. A prayer that would reflect thankfulness to God, and a commitment to trust and follow Him. It was a sincere prayer, the prayer of a child in Christ.

It went something like this: “Heavenly Father, we thank you for this day. We thank you for the many blessings that you have given us. We ask that you would bless this food to nourish our bodies – to give us strength that we might delight in your will and walk in your ways.”

A simple sentence began that prayer, “We thank you for this day.” A simple sentence that contains an even simpler phrase, “this day.”

Since I first wrote that prayer, more than 4,500 “this days” have come and gone. The sun has risen and set on thousands of days. Some really good days. And some really hard days.

That phrase, “thank you for this day,” has passed from my lips countless times. So many times that the words often seem to launch without so much as a thought.

To be honest, I often fail to fully engage until a few sentences later. But today I caught myself. “This day.” “This day?”

Why do I thank God for “this day”? Why do you thank God for “this day”? Why should we thank God for “this day”?

Had the phrase lost its meaning?

Upon further reflection, the phrase, though brief, has potential for great depth. When prayed intentionally, thanking God for “this day” can provide us with a view to the past, the present and the future.

The view to the past reminds us that “this day” is the product of God’s work in our lives over months, years, even decades. He has been at work – in ways that we see and ways that we never see.

Without that work in my life, I don’t know where I would be. I do know it wouldn’t be good. Emptiness. Lack of purpose. Divorce. Wounded children. They were all in my future. But God had other plans. Plans that began with one “this day.” This “this day” – today – is the product of those plans of God and can truly be described as “the day that the Lord has made.” I can (and should) rejoice and be glad in it.

The view to the past also reminds us of the promises of the future. As a good friend once said, “God’s past faithfulness builds future confidence.” We can be confident in “this day” and the days to come because of the faithfulness of God.

As the classic hymn Amazing Grace rightly leads us to sing:
Through many dangers, toils, and snares
I have already come;
'tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,
and grace will lead me home.

The road of faith has its share of bumps and potholes, not to mention head-on collisions. But as we witness God’s presence and grace bearing us up through rough courses and healing the whiplash that life sometimes deals out, we come to possess an unshakeable hope. An unshakeable hope that He will bring us through whatever might come our way. (Rom 5:3-5; 2Cor 1:10)

As a result, fear of the unknown is replaced by confidence in the One who is known. Because of God’s faithfulness in the past, we have a view to the future that is filled with confidence and hope.

Finally, the phrase “this day” is a critical one to remind us that “this day” is unique. Once it passes, it is gone forever – along with its opportunities. They are opportunities we don’t want to miss. Opportunities to give thanks. Opportunities to grow our faith. Opportunities to glorify God. To make things right. To love our neighbors as ourselves. To shine the light of Christ into someone else’s life.

“This day” is not only about today. It is about the past – the past faithfulness of God. It is about the present – the present work of God in and through our lives. It is about the future – a future filled with promise and hope.

May thanking God for “this day” remind us of the past, keep us watchful in the present and give us hope for the future.

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD,
plans for wholeness and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.”

Jeremiah 29:11

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POSTSCRIPT

Can you see the work of God in your life? Or is this a foreign concept to you? Has that new day – the birth of a life of true faith – dawned for you? Do you have hope for the future that depends not on yourself but on an unshakeable God? That is what your heavenly Father offers you through faith in his Son, Jesus Christ.

It is no light commitment, however. It is one in which we answer the call of Christ to “follow me,” wherever He leads. Jesus wants nothing less than all of us – our whole heart, our whole mind, and access to our every corner of our life.

He says that the road of faith is narrow and difficult, but it is the road that leads to life. The wide and easy road that so many of us choose to follow leads only to our own destruction.

He tells us that in following Him we will find true life (John 6:35) and contentment we can find nowhere else (John 14:6). He says we will possess fullness of joy (John 15:11). And He promises that, though we die physically, we shall live with Him forever in Paradise – the Extreme Home Improvement version of the Garden of Eden (John 11:25).

Sometimes we treat God as if He were someone we needed to defend ourselves against. We raise up a shield to keep Him away as if He were a cosmic fun stopper. But a cosmic fun stopper He is not.

He is a wonderful, devoted Father who went to great expense to show His love for you. He is the creator of every good thing. Though we stop up our ears, He shouts His love for us in myriad ways: spectacular sunsets, majestic mountains, calming ocean tides, culinary delights, the compassion of a friend, the embrace of a child. They are all good things. They are all gifts given by a good God.

Today, “this day,” is He calling you? Do you hear a whisper in your soul? A gentle whisper calling you to lay down the shield? To stop running? And to turn to the source of true life and true joy?

He’s waiting. He really is. And He’s more ready to embrace you than you are to turn.

Stop. Lay it down. Turn.

The sooner you do, the sooner you’ll discover a part of you that was meant to be crazy about Him too.

Our Refuge

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“For you have been a stronghold to the poor,
a stronghold to the needy in his distress,
a shelter from the storm and a shade from the heat.”
Isa 25:4

My family and I live in Phoenix, Arizona. Certain times of year we count that a blessing and others we wonder if it might be a curse.

“Valley of the Sun” is the moniker given to Phoenix some time ago. It is a fitting nickname as we enjoy an average of 334 days of sunshine per year. In January it rolls off the tongue so nicely as bundled up reporters deliver images of blizzards and word of sub-zero windchills in other parts of the country. “Ahhh, yes,” we say to ourselves, “we are blessed to be in the Valley of the Sun.”

The Summer, however, can find us singing a bit of a different tune. After 14 consecutive days of 100+ temps and relentless sun, those 334 days of sunshine can seem like 300 too many. We begin to wish that the 31 days of clouds would arrive all in a row to give us a much needed break. It is at this point that I often modify the nickname: Valley of the Scorching Sun.

The sun seemed to unleash its full fury on me recently as I enjoyed a run through our neighborhood. The advent of September had reduced its intensity some, but it was still plenty fierce for me. I found myself criss-crossing the streets to take advantage of shade trees - even planning the next segment of my route based on the maturity of its foliage and the angle of the sun. I relished in the coolness of every patch of shade and the relief it brought to my weary muscles as cool air swept over them.

Life can be like that sun of ours. It too has its seasons.

Some days we bask in its warm glow. We are living the dream. Enjoying the moment and the truly precious gifts that have come our way. Thankfulness wells up within us, refreshing our resolve and seasoning our speech.

And then there are the scorchers. Those days where life seems to have our number and “fate” seems to treat us like its little brother – pushing every button we have until our patience and our tongue are ready to burst into flame. It is on those days that we wonder how much more we can take. It is on those days that peace seems more like a distant cousin than a close companion.

When I am in the middle of a scorcher, I often need to remind myself that a good God created everything – including life (Gen 1). That He had ordered and numbered my days (including this one) before the first beat of my heart (Psa 139:16). That the One who created the sun also created the trees. He who created the heat also gives us the coolness of a patch of shade.

The funny thing about that patch of shade is that you have to run to it if you want to experience its coolness. Far too often, it seems, we want to experience the peace of God without ever seeking His presence. We want him to shade us from life’s scorchers, but we don’t bother to take refuge in the shadow of His wings (Psa 36:7). We want all of the life-giving benefits of a pit stop, but we continue around the track at 150 miles per hour without ever pulling in.

After 5 years of seminary classes, some assignments stand out for their sheer workload while others stand out for the blessing they bestowed. I remember the latter most clearly. A dear professor gave us this homework assignment one week: Go into a closet or other quiet place and spend 45 minutes with the Lord. Don’t talk. Don’t pray. Don’t ask. Just be still – inside and out – before the Lord.

We turned in a brief paragraph about the experience. I just re-read mine. For the sake of space, I won’t tell you everything, but I will tell you that it includes the word “struggle” (we’re not used to being quiet, you know). But it also includes words like “serenity” and “peacefulness” as well as “vision.”

Are you in a scorcher? Where will you find the shade you need?

Are you still out on the track? Your crew chief is beckoning you to pull in for a pit stop.

His refuge is waiting.

Take refuge in the shadow of your Father’s wings and let the coolness of his presence refresh your weary spirit.

“You keep him in perfect peace
whose mind is stayed on you,
because he trusts in you.
Trust in the Lord forever,
for the Lord God is an everlasting rock.”
Isaiah 26:3-4